Scope Ratings has assigned credit ratings to two of Georgia’s best known food-retailing and drinks companies, a sign of the leading European ratings agency’s commitment to expand in emerging markets in the Caspian and Black sea regions. Scope assigned a B+/Stable rating to JSC Nikora Trade, a food retailer with around 220 shops in Georgia, and a BB-/Stable rating to The Georgian Beer Company JSC, a brewer and supplier of soft drinks.
Scope is confident that the coverage of Nikora Trade and Georgian Beer are just the beginning of a long-term presence in Georgia and the broader region. “Our pipeline is promising and we are optimistic that our activities in this market will continue to grow,” says Torsten Hinrichs, managing director of Scope Ratings.
The mandates from the two Georgian companies follow the addition of Scope to the list of external credit-assessment institutions accepted by the National Bank of Georgia, the country’s central bank. Debt securities of issuers rated by Scope are potentially eligible for the central bank’s monetary operations. Scope assigned Georgia a sovereign credit rating (BB/Stable) last June as part of the expansion of its public-finance ratings across Europe and other major economies.
Scope is a privately-held rating agency based in Berlin, with offices in in Frankfurt, London, Madrid, Milan, Oslo and Paris. We specialise in the analysis and ratings of financial institutions, corporates, structured finance, project finance and public finance.
